Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Viral biofilms

Some kinds of bacteria have been known to congregate into ‘biofilms’. Normally, free swimming bacteria which are susceptible to antibiotics and other treatments become remarkably resilient. They stick to surfaces with remarkable tenacity and are exceedingly difficult to kill. In addition, they sometimes produce toxins not made by their planktonic kin.

The viral biofilms appear to serve the same function as their bacterial counterparts, namely to offer increased infectivity and protection from the immune system. Removing the viral biofilm from infected cell surfaces reduced infection rates by up to 80%.

Although it is not yet known whether other types of viruses can form these aggregates, scientists are hopeful that this new data will open up new anti-viral treatments that target biofilms.

Stochastic Scientist? What's up with that?

Why the Stochastic Scientist? As I'm sure you all know, 'stochastic' is another word for 'random', which is what I intend for the focus of this blog. Although my formal training is as a molecular biologist, there are many other fields of science that are also fascinating and beautiful. It's my intention to blog about which ever scientific discovery or invention catches my, and hopefully your, fancy.

I also hope to inspire people to learn more about science. By choosing among a huge variety of scientific endeavors, I'll undoubtably hit upon something that will pique my readers' interest.

I guess I could have called my blog 'The Joy of Science', but that wouldn't have been quite so random.